I reported to art therapy at nine; to my counselor, Mrs. Dupree, at ten thirty; and at noon, I went to lunch in the dining hall. I was now allowed to talk quietly with the others, but the conversations felt stilted. Everyone at Belmont was working hard to get out of the institute, and there was a real sense that anything anyone said might later be used against them—reported to Dr. Belmont, Mrs. Winningham, or one of the counselors. Everyone was on guard except for Sheffield Schoeffler, who antagonized Dr. Belmont whenever he had the chance.
At twelve forty-five, I had physical education, and from two to four, I had reading and mathematics. Prayers and lectures lasted from four to six. Then, we had dinner. The next day was the same. As was every day that followed, except Friday. Fridays were special. At seven o’clock, there was a social in the ballroom on the first floor. It was a grand, romantic space with a vaulted ceiling and crystal chandelier. Underfoot, there was a tile mosaic of a country scene with girls in bustles and hats, a horse pulling a cart. I walked back and forth, imagining myself in the cart leaving Belmont.
Against the far wall, there was a long table covered with an embroidered tablecloth, a punch bowl with crystal glasses hanging from the rim, and a plate of sugar cookies. On that first Friday, I stood against the wall, holding a glass of punch. Sheffield Schoeffler approached, offering me a cookie.
“Thank you.”
“Sure,” he said. “They’re free and everything.”
I smiled.
He stood beside me, his back against the wall. “What’s your name? I got the Ricci part. It precedes Schoeffler.”
I nibbled the cookie, watching the boys and girls dance stiffly across the tiles. “Gloria.”
“Mine’s Sheffield, but you can call me Sheff.”
The last thing I needed, and I knew it, was an alliance with a troublemaker. Then again, he was the only one with any chutzpah, who didn’t seem defeated at square one. I guess I should’ve known: I’ve always been attracted to chutzpah.
“So, what’s your story?” he asked. “What brings you here?”
“I don’t have a story.”
“Me either. That’s cool. No one here has a story. It’s just a fun place to be.”
I turned to face him. “I’d rather not say. That’s all. I’m just trying to get along and get out of here.”
He seemed to consider what I’d said. “Well, I’ll tell you mine.”
I shrugged. “If you want.”
“You don’t have to beg …”
I smiled.
“Here goes: I was a pretentious faggot menace. I came here last year, and they cured me of pretentiousness, but not the faggot-menace bit, and apparently that’s the real problem. Who knew?”
I cracked up, spraying cookie crumbs.
“Okay, now it’s your turn.”
I sipped my punch before beginning, “First, I shouldn’t be here. If they’d let me call my parents, I know that they’d come get me. I wasn’t forced to come here. I actually agreed to come here.”
“So you’re certifiably insane.”
“Basically.”
“They won’t,” he said, “let you call your parents. I’m sorry. But it’s nice to know that if you did call them, they’d come get you, but they won’t let you call.” He paused. “My parents sent me here. If they could, they’d keep me here forever. My pop thinks I’m some kind of karmic payback for all the fags he terrorized at university. My mother can’t stand me.”
“That’s awful.”
Sheff shrugged. “So, why in the world did you agree to come here, Gloria Ricci?”
“I’m a lesbian, I guess.”
“You guess. You’re not sure.”
“I mean, I just fell in love. But she doesn’t love me.” I tipped my head back. “I’m not going to cry.”
He looked genuinely sad. “Don’t cry. It’s best to save the boohooing for when you repent. Then, your counselor will really want to see you fall apart. Trust me on this one.” Sheff sipped his punch. “My pop says he’ll have this place burned to the ground if they don’t fix me. He’s a steel man. He owns the company and oversees the factory operations. He expects everyone to fall in line, especially me.”
“My dad works for the phone company.”
“Is your dad awful?”
“He means well,” I said.
“My parents are complete terrors. The worst. They’ve already picked out the girl I’m supposed to marry. Can you imagine? It’s medieval. Her name is Buttercup Hepburn. We’re supposed to join two great families together.”
“Like a dynasty or something.”
“I guess, but I’m not marrying Buttercup Hepburn. When I get out of here, I’m going to Chelsea. There’s a boy there waiting for me. He looks like Sal Mineo.”
“I love Sal Mineo. Rebel Without a Cause is one of my favorite movies.”
“You’ll have to get your own Sal Mineo. This one’s mine.” He smiled. His eyes were tiny sapphires under the chandelier light.
“Are you in love with him?”
“I don’t know what that is.”
“Very funny.”
“I’m serious.” He handed me a napkin and touched around his mouth to let me know that I had a red-punch mustache. “I’ve never been in love. I’ve been in lust, but not love.” We went to a line of chairs running the length of the wall. Sheff said, “Tell me about your great love, but only if you can do it without crying.”
“She went home to Virginia. She’s getting married.” I felt the tears pooling.
“Married. Really? How old is she?”
“Almost seventeen.”
“And she’s getting married?”
“Next year. She said that I was just a summer fling, a phase. She wrote me a letter. She said that we weren’t real, and she said that she was sorry if I thought otherwise.” I wiped the tears from my cheeks.
“What a bitch.”
We sat there in silence. After a moment, he turned to me. “Do you want to dance?”
“I’m not very good.”
“We’re basically in prison,” he said. “I’m not exactly picky when it comes to dance partners.”
He was such a show-off, displaying an amalgamation of dance steps, a regular Gene Kelly with his fancy footwork. I expected him to dance up the wall, but then he settled down, taking my hand and pulling me close. As we moved across the floor, he told me about his family’s cook, Gabby. “She’s been with us since I was two.” He spun me, tossing one hand in the air. “Added flair,” he noted before continuing. “She’s the one who first taught me to dance and to cook. She doesn’t even care that I’m gay.”
I thought of my neighbor Gwen Babineaux. When my mother had been absent, she’d been there for me. I told Sheff about Gwen, how she’d cooked for me and my dad. “She never taught me to dance, but I know she would’ve if I’d asked.” Sheff and I danced and talked until the social ended at ten o’clock. “Sit with me at dinner tomorrow,” he said.
“Absolutely.”
When I returned to my room, moonlight filled the prism window. Soon, it would disappear, and it would be dark again. I rolled over to face the wall, remembering Isabel, how our last night together had ended with her standing on her aunt’s front porch while I was guided into the back seat of a police car.
4
AT DINNER THE NEXT NIGHT, I sat beside Sheff. He was playing with his food. Outside, it began to rain, and the drops pattered against the window. Sheff turned to me. “I’ve been thinking. I might try aversion therapy.”
“What’s that?”
“I don’t know exactly, but they say it works.” He rearranged his green beans, calling them grass. “I can’t be who I am and get out of this place. Dr. Belmont guarantees that this therapy works, so if I do it, my dad will think I’ve changed.”
“Do you want to change? Do you want to go with girls? Do you want to be what your pop wants you to be?” I put a green bean above my lip, pretending it was a mustache, wanting to see him smile.
“I shouldn’t have come here,” I said. “They’re not helping me.”
“They don’t help anyone.”
With two green beans, I made an X on my forehead.
“You should come to Chelsea,” he said. “When we get out of here, we should meet there.”
“We should.” I paused. “We will.”
But I never thought we would. Not really.
At our next Friday night social, Sheff took my hand and led me to the darkest corner of the ballroom. He pulled me down where we wouldn’t be seen by the chaperones. “It was the first baseman, Chip Lightner,” he began. I sat with my knees to the side while Sheff crouched.
“Who’s Chip Lightner?”
“The reason I’m back here again. Dr. Belmont never tires of hearing this story. He’s the real pervert. Not us.” Sheff took a deep breath. “I never showered with the other guys at school. I always waited. I didn’t care if I was late to class… . I just felt weird being there with the others because everybody knew that I liked boys. I tried to be invisible, keep my nose clean, but then one day, I go to take a shower after I think everybody’s gone, but Chip’s there in the locker room. ‘I was waiting for you,’ he says. And I’m not stupid. I was waiting for a bunch of guys to jump out and kick my ass, but it didn’t go that way. Chip put his hands on my waist.” Sheff swallowed hard, then dropped his head before looking up at me, his eyes gray. “Chip started trying to unzip my pants, and I’m telling him to leave me alone. I wanted to get out of there. Just the same, I was rock hard.” Sheff shook his head. “If I could take that blow job back, I fucking would. I’d take it back in a second … Of course, the football coach walked in. Mind you, Chip’s the one on his knees, but the coach yells for me to get away from him like it’s all me, all my fault.” Sheff leaned forward, pretending to take a bow. “Yes, yes, thank you. No need for a standing ovation. I’m the great faggot menace, so it was all my doing. I forced my dick into the baseball player’s mouth. Good show, Mr. Schoeffler.” Then, he seemed to crumble. He pulled his legs to his chest, and I heard him sniffling. He was breaking his own rule. He was about to cry.
I said, “You’re a threat to baseball players everywhere. No wonder they locked you up.”
“I lied to you before,” he whispered. “If I could get fixed, if I could really get fixed and be straight, I would. I’d do it in a minute. It would just make everything easier.”
“Don’t say that.”
“Why?”
I put my arms around his neck. “You wouldn’t be you.”
He smiled faintly. “I like your hair.” He reached for one of my curls and twisted it around his finger.
“And at least you gave up pretense. You can’t forget that. That’s a big deal.”
We sat across from each other, my curls wrapped in his pointer fingers. We were simpatico. Sheff took a deep breath. “After the coach went to see my pop, Pop asked me, ‘Why do you do this?’ and I said, ‘Because you expect it from me.’ Then, Pop hauled off and punched me in the jaw. I wasn’t going to fight him about going back to Belmont. I just didn’t have it in me. Later, I told him I was sorry, that I was going to do better, but he didn’t want to hear it.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“It’s your turn. Tell me a story.”
I unwound my hair from his fingers, and taking his hands in mine, we scooted so that our backs were against the wall, our legs side by side. My yellow strappy heels in line beside his black oxfords. “My first kiss was with a girl named Amelia. She and I went to elementary school together.”
“Sounds terribly inappropriate.”
I smiled. “It wasn’t. Not really. At lunch, Amelia would sit with her leg pressed to mine. In class, she scooted her desk closer to mine. She made it a good two feet before Sister Teresa warned her to retreat. ‘We don’t move our desks, Amelia,’ she scolded, all nunlike, making a big show, thwacking her yardstick on Amelia’s desk. I remember that Amelia burst into tears, but she refused to move her desk back. The nuns moved the desk with her sitting in it.” I laughed.
“In fifth grade, she chased me to a big oak on the edge of the playground and we kissed. It was the most natural thing. We kissed again. Then she ran off. It was innocent, but I really liked her. Maybe that’s when I first knew I liked girls, liked kissing them. You know … Then, on the last day of sixth grade, Amelia came up to me on the playground and said she’d be going to a different school for seventh grade. She said, ‘You won’t see me again.’ I asked her if she was moving, and she said no, that she was just changing schools, so I asked why, and I remember her saying, ‘Because I’m not like everybody else.’
“I pursued it. ‘What do you mean?’
“She said, ‘You’re not the first girl I’ve kissed. I keep getting caught.’ I never saw her again. I’ve always wondered if the next school in the next town or wherever fixed her, made her like everybody else. I wish that I’d said something like, ‘I’m not like everybody else either,’ but I think that I acted like it was no big deal.”
“And you’re pining over some girl named Isabel? Who cares about Isabel? Sounds like you need to find this Amelia.”
“You’re right.” I held back tears.
Sheff talked about his Gabby. “When I was little and I had a nightmare or got scared, she’d let me sleep with her. When I was four or five, I had a bad dream and tried climbing in bed with my parents, but my mother woke and said, ‘What are you doing in here?’ I told her I’d had a bad dream, and she said, ‘You’re not a baby. Go back to your own bed.’ ” He paused. “Obviously, she’s a really swell mother. So, I started going to Gabby’s room. She’d make me a glass of warm milk, read a story, tuck me in beside her. She’s always been good to me.”
“I get it, how important it is to have somebody like that. My mom and I used to be close.” I remembered the years before the twins died, how when the weather was warm we would play in the backyard. She’d pretend to eat the mud pies I made. She brought out wooden spoons, bowls and pots, and while I ran the hose, slinging mud, she let me wear her favorite apron. Twice a week, I helped her with the laundry, handing her wet clothes from the basket while she pinned them to the line. I would reach as high as I could, saying, “I’m almost as tall as you,” and she’d tousle my hair. She was my favorite person until I wasn’t hers.
“What happened?” Sheff asked.
“She got depressed.” I heard the jingle of keys and looked up to see the janitor, Mr. Weathers, pushing his mop. Then, Mrs. Winningham, dark-eyed demon, was on his heels. “What are you two doing? The dance is over. You’re not supposed to be here.”
As we parted, Sheff squeezed my pinky. “See you tomorrow.”
Yes. Tomorrow. I had something to look forward to.
5
MRS. DUPREE, MY COUNSELOR, HAD patchwork scars up and down her arms, but she kept them hidden beneath flouncy sleeves that draped over her wrists. She had light brown hair and brown eyes. Aside from her scars, there was nothing striking about her. She told me that she’d been a member of the Pentecostal Holiness Church before being called to work with Dr. Belmont, as if the Belmont Institute were a religious order. We met daily. She set a timer for ninety minutes. It ticked away while I sat in a hard-back chair, a mammoth desk between us. There were no bathroom breaks except for emergencies. During every session, I was told that the only way to acknowledge and accept my sin was to relive the experience. With each detail I revealed, Mrs. Dupree’s words became more volatile, and I became more vulnerable: “Do you think that lying naked with another girl is acceptable in the eyes of God? It’s not,” she assured me. “A man lies with a woman to bear fruit. Do you want to be filthy in the eyes of God?” I knew that my God and Anna Dupree’s god were not the same.
I still believed in God then.
For every good memory I relayed, she explained that Isabel and I
were not in our right minds. What existed between us was not love. “Do you think Isabel Sullivan cares about you? Do you think she loved you? Because she didn’t. You were the devil’s instrument.” She continued, “Do you know that God so loved the world that he gave his only son so that you might live?” She pointed at me, momentarily forgetting her scars, the sleeves flouncing above her wrists, scaly purple flesh revealed. I stared, wondering what had happened to her.
“Tell me how you met Isabel.”
“At church,” I said, “but before that, I saw her in the woods behind my house. There’s a creek there.”
“What did you notice about her?”
“She was wearing a bathing suit, playing in the water. Her hair was in a braid.”
“But you met her at church?”
I nodded. “I met her at church, but I first saw her in the woods.”
“Why didn’t you introduce yourself when you saw her in the woods?”
“I don’t know. I hid.”
“Why did you hide?”
“I don’t know.”
“But you do know. Tell me.”
I rubbed my eyes. I was tired. “I didn’t know her,” I said. “I didn’t know anything about her.”
“What happened the next time you saw her?”
Mrs. Dupree had her arms at her sides behind the big desk. She leaned back in her springy chair. “Go on. Tell the story.” I’d told it before. I had to tell it again. I had to tell it every day.
“I met her at church, and she invited me to come over to her aunt’s house to listen to records.”
“What happened next?”
“I don’t know. We listened to Beatles records. She taught me to do the mashed potato and some other dances.”
“Then what happened?”
I told Mrs. Dupree how things progressed. How we moved from dancing to hand holding to kissing. If I left out a detail, she corrected me. I spoke repeatedly about the beginning, middle, and ending of our relationship. Mrs. Dupree never tired of hearing about the last chapter, the part where we were caught, where Isabel’s aunt flipped on the light switch, two police officers standing behind her. Isabel and I were naked, a pink sheet balled up between us.
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